Archive for the ‘do-it-yourself’ tag

If you want to keep your old Ford or Ford-powered machine running as good or better than it did from Ford, then legendary flathead guru Vern Tardel, as the title of this handy series of how-to booklets suggests, is here to help you do just that.

We have, in fact, already taken a look into these booklets back around issue No.3 or No.4, in the December 2011 issue of Hemmings Motor News. In booklet No.9 Vern gets down to the business of Ford Generator Service & Repair, including the upgrade path from a 6-volt to a 12-volt system. Not only does Vern tell you which parts are required to do the job, but he also shows you how to make some tools that will help get things done.

That’s right – make your own tools out of items scored at the swap meet for under a sawbuck. (Some assembly may be required. Welding equipment not included.) And while we have not tested this theory due to budget concerns, dropping a Ford generator case on this printed booklet will likely be a lot less expensive than dropping the same case on an electronic tablet. These booklets cover everything from dropped axles to Stromberg service and are the perfect size (and price) for shop use. Vern Tardel’s Let Me Help You Series booklets are available from Vern Tardel Enterprises.

Back in the 1950s and early 1960s, do-it-yourself handbooks were immensely popular. There were several different brands, most of which were published by the major magazines such as Popular Mechanics and Popular Science. But one small company was Davis Publications out of Chicago, which published one of the best – the Car Repair Handbook.

These softcover, digest-size handbooks, many of which were published annually, ran about 168 pages in length, and were lavishly illustrated with many black and white photographs and line drawings, all on uncoated, newsprint-type paper. It wasn’t so much their quality that attracted buyers but their highly informative and well-written contents.

Each story ran between two and six pages, and with its small type, there was a ton of information crammed into those pages. In this issue alone there were 36 articles, several of which were road and performance tests of new cars, both domestic and imported. They were titled: “Lubricate the Car Yourself”; “How to Install Seat Belts”; “Cross-Country Test of a Valiant”; “26 Emergency Roadside Repairs”; “Stopping Trunk Leaks and Rust”; “Four Ways to Stretch Your Garage”; “How to Prevent and Cure Vapor Lock”; “Testing the ’47 Lincoln Continental”, and “Making a Car Battery Charger,” among many others.

Finding these handbooks is rather easy; just attend any of the major swap meets, such as Autofair, Carlisle, Daytona, Dunkirk, Hershey, Iola, Pate, Pomona, Springfield or Zephyrhills, and you’re almost certain to find several vendors selling them. Their popularity back in the day means that there are plenty to go around today. Every time I go to Hershey, I end up buying a few, and rarely pay more than $5 apiece. Amazon has them for a little more. For the price of a beer, you’ll be amazed as to just how much valuable information and insightful knowledge you’ll gain from reading them.

Linguists have already noted how the term “redneck” has gone through a reappropriation transition in recent years, becoming less of an epithet and more of a means of group participation through self-identification. At the same time, we’ve seen a shift in the use of the word as an adjective, becoming less a term to describe something shoddy and careless and more a term to describe anything improvised, moving along the spectrum from “half-baked” toward “MacGyvered.” We presume that Dale Osterman used it in its latter meaning in his story on My Hemmings when describing the paint booth he set up for his 1976 Pontiac Trans Am.

Dale, of Prattville, Alabama – who a few years back sent us some family car photos – bought the Trans Am in 2004, calling it his “mid-life crisis car,” and put it into use as a daily driver for the next six years. While he removed the wheel spats and decals during this time in preparation for the pending restoration, it wasn’t until 2010 that he began to tear it down in earnest, sanding and priming the body in his backyard without need for a garage. Instead, he put up a picnic shelter with flyscreens and went to work. The carport that he built last year appeared to come in handy for painting the whole car too. With all but one coat of clear on the Trans Am (he’s saving the decals for after that last coat), he’s satisfied with the results enough to share some photos with us here.

Do you have a story or photos of your collector car that you’d like to share? Sign up for My Hemmings today!

High-pressure Flow Jet water cutting system in action at TechShop. Image courtesy of TechShop.

Whether it’s true or not, we Americans love to think we can do anything we put our minds to and make anything we put our hands to. Sometimes, it’s just a matter of having the right tools, we tend to tell ourselves, and that project would get finished lickety-split.

With the advent of TechShop, we might no longer be able to use that excuse about the tools or the shop space. TechShop is a membership-based workshop that makes an incredible array of tools and equipment available to members, along with expert instruction on using them. Currently, California-based TechShop operates five workshops: Menlo Park, San Jose, and San Francisco, California; Raleigh, North Carolina; and Detroit. They are currently in the planning stages to open their first shop in the Northeast in Brooklyn, New York. Current plans call for rolling out TechShop in three to five new cities each year.

Machine shop at the Detroit TechShop.

While set up to support a burgeoning DIY movement, the TechShop may be just the ticket for an amateur restorer. They have equipment for power-coating parts in the finishing room. They have sheetmetal brakes, large, industrial punches and even an English wheel.

Having a hard time finding that unique plastic piece that has been broken for five owners and 50 years? How about just printing a new one? That’s right; TechShop also has state-of-the-art 3D printers that can rapidly create plastic parts from a CAD file.

The metal shop at the San Francisco TechShop.

Along with an array of the latest machine tools for working metal, including such advanced equipment as a four-axis, CNC milling machine, TechShop also has equipment for casting various materials, working with wood, plastic and sheetmetal. Hand tools, power tools and large stationary tools, along with plenty of workbench space are all hallmarks of TechShop. An automotive area includes floor jacks, jack stands, a transmission lift, an engine hoist and even pneumatic tools. Plasma cutters and heavy-duty industrial sewing machines are also fair game for members.

The array of tools simply boggles the mind and truly dwarfs what would be found in most restoration shops, particularly when it comes to machine tools. Modern lathes and Bridgeport milling machines with digital readouts are part of the landscape. The list goes on and on, but suffice to say that if you can imagine it, you could probably build it at TechShop. Perhaps as much as the presence of the tools, TechShop’s biggest contribution might be the community that grows around the hundreds of members at each TechShop, each person working on his own project inspiring his fellow members.

TechShop founder Jim Newton brings the heat.

TechShop, whose motto is “Build your dreams here,” was started by Jim Newton, who found himself lacking suitable space for his projects when he left a job as the science adviser for Mythbusters on the Discovery Channel. Along with access to tools and space, Newton’s business provides expert instruction in safety and use of the tools. Members must take safety classes for those tools that could potentially injure you.

Clean, well equipped work space helps make TechShop a great place to build and create. Note the electrical power and pneumatic connections hanging over each work table.

TechShop membership works like a gym, with monthly and annual deals available. Membership ranges from $125 per month to $1,200 per year, with student pricing and family add-on memberships discounted. Given that each TechShop has around $750,000 worth of equipment under its roof, the value is impressive, and you’d be hard pressed to duplicate even a fraction of the equipment at those membership rates.

It’s not a new concept, providing space and tools for others to pay to use, but it’s one that’s been sporadically implemented in latter decades. Here’s hoping we’ll see such community workspaces spring up in cities and towns all across the country in the near future. For more information, visit TechShop.ws.

If you’ve ever lived in an apartment, or in some other arrangement where you didn’t have access to a space to work on your car, you’ve likely had the same idea that Ray Woolley had: a self-service garage, where the garage owner provides the space and tools for rent, while you provide the labor. Woolley discussed his idea rather in depth for an article in the November 1951 issue of Mechanix Illustrated.

Would an idea like this work today? Of course not. You’d have lawyers swarming on you in an instant, and if you managed to fend them off, you’d have insurance rates through the roof. I would like to know, though, how long Woolley made a go at his idea. However long Ray Woolley’s Self-Service Garage did make it, we know that it doesn’t exist today: a Mercado Garibaldi occupies the building today at 1051 W. Washington Blvd. in Los Angeles.